


exchange the experiance

by AslansCompass



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: 3x08 AU, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-05-19 20:54:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19363981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AslansCompass/pseuds/AslansCompass
Summary: The surgery failed. Cassandra is dying.Jenkins refuses to accept that.





	1. Chapter 1

"Surgery was intense. The tumor was deeply entrenched." 

"Doctor, just tell us. Is Cassandra...." Eve bit her lip. The awkward silence told her all she needed to know.  No physician would delay good news.

"Even if she walks up, there's no knowing if she'll be coherent. I'm sorry." The doctor offered a hand. "I can take you to her room."

Stone placed a hand on Eve's shoulder.  "We'll be there."

"Yeah," Jones fought back tears. "We're family."

The four of them turned down the hallway. 

Jenkins remained motionless.

"Jenkins, come on." Flynn urged.

"You should be with us."

Jenkins shook his head. "Should? There's so many things that should have happened. This... this isn't one of them." He headed back through the Door to the Library without saying a word. 

* * *

The room was too quiet and too noisy at the same time.  For all the beeping and ticking machines,  it felt frozen, an empty set abandoned halfway through the production. But would the lights come up on the second act or end with a curtain call?

Blue light gleamed as Jenkins rushed through the door. He held a small green planter in both hands, with a leather-bound book tucked under one arm. He set the planter on the side table and handed the book to Stone. "Read this," he ordered, pointing to a set of lines near the middle of the page.

 "Friendship is vowing toward immortality and does not know the passing away of beauty because it aims for the spirit."

Flynn recognized the lines immediately. The Epic of Gilgimash, circa 2100 BCE, one of, if not the, earliest known surviving works of literature in the world. And the plant in Jenkin's hands.....buckthorn.  As Stone read, vines grew around Jenkin's hands, spilling out of the pot and twisting towards Cassandra.

"Transference," Flynn whispered to himself. "I didn't know you could--"

Jenkins set his face like flint. "I've had my time. More than enough. She's had so little."

"What's happening?" Jones demanded.

"He's giving her his immortality," Flynn explained.

"Jenkins!"

"But--"

"Mr. Stone, I need you to finish the passage!"

"Hold my hand in yours, and we will not fear what hands like ours can do." The vines flashed like lightning. Spots flickered in front of everyone's eyes. 

"Guys...." Cassaandra opened her eyes. "What happened?"

 


	2. Chapter 2

It's his job to watch out for them, Jenkins tells himself.  Sure, Eve is the  _Guardian,_ but she has four Librarians to deal with, not just one. And if he's particularly concerned with one of them, well, what of it?  Cassandra (Miss Killian) nearly died, not in a grand adventure or saving the world, but just....because...

She almost _died_ and there would have been no villain, no one to blame. No one to take vengeance on (not that vengeance makes matters better; oh, he learned that lesson centuries ago. And then re-learned it, because pain makes you forget.)

All that to say, so what if he's keeping a close eye on Cassandra recently? The world moves so quickly these days, from airplanes to outer space in seventy years; twenty years from email to internet. Even an ordinary life sees so many changes now.  That's one way--sometimes the only way--he knows to explain it.  To be immortal means to watch the world change around you.

Except he isn't, is he? Not anymore. Every breath he has to take, every bite he has to eat--he's mortal now. 

Cass isn't.

One night, about three or four weeks after-- _afterwards_ ,  Jenkins hears something in the Annex at 4 in the morning. Intruders? No, the alarms would have gone off. Flynn? No, impossible. Far too quiet. Flynn was incapable of entering without a personal soundtrack, or at least a wind machine.

Jones indulging in light burglary? Possibly. Jenkins rolls his eyes and heads down the stairs.  That boy just has to poke his nose into everything. And if that wasn't bad enough, he always came up roses. No wasps or dung heaps. Not that anyone around her would know the smell of a dung heap. Actually... Jenkins frowns. He isn't sure if _he_ remembers dung heaps. Tanneries, though, he remembers tanneries. That stench is truly impossible to forget.

"Jenkins?"

It's not Jones. It's Cassandra. She looks up at him, hastily shoving a scroll aside. "I thought you were asleep."

"Well, I'm not very good at it."

"Sleeping?"

"Yes, well, I've gone without for fifteen hundred years, I'm out of practice."

"When I can't sleep, I tend to make myself a mug of hot cider. I could make you some if you like."

"That would be very nice."

Cassandra left the room and came back five minutes later with two steaming mugs, caramel syrup, and a small bowl of mini marshmallows.  "It's like whipped cream, but not as messy," she explained. "Would you like some?" 

"Why not?"

They talk for a little while. Jenkins looks at the scroll and offers some help translating. 

No, it can wait for Stone.

It's really no bother. I could teach you, if you want.

I don't... I mean, I'm sciency. Language, not really my thing.

It's just another type of code. 

* * *

 

It becomes a pattern, early morning/late night tea in the Annex;  Jenkins and Cassandra cataloging artifacts and studying manuscripts while the others are asleep; slowly adjusting to the new rhythm of their lives. In time, Jenkin re-adopts a circadian rhythm; Cassandra finds an ebb and flow. 

One night, after a particularly exhausting mission, the rest of the team beds down in the Annex for the night.  Eve wakes for a moment to a raised voice.

"No, eye of newt is not a reference to mustard seed!"

"But--"

"The characters are witches; it's meant to sound gross!"

"Oh, so you know Shakespeare?"

"Not personally, however...."

Eve smiled and rolled back to sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

"Ugh, is it over yet?" Cassandra rolled her eyes. "I want to go home!"

"They have to make sure you're okay," Eve reminded her.

"Of course I'm okay, I'm alive, aren't I? Ugh, hospitals are so dumb! I swear I've done every Sudoku in the building! Can't Jones just break me out?"

"He and Flynn are in South Dakota on a mission."

"Stone?"

"Attending an architect conference in New York."

"I'm missing all the fun."

"Stone isn't on a case. He just wanted to go."

"Great. Because that makes all the difference."

"Look, if there's somewhere special you want to go--"

"No, no.... that's not it. I finally have all this time and I'm stuck in a freaking hospital.  I could be out doing things....anything."

Eve reached under her chair. "I brought you something." She set a wrapped package on the bed. 

Cassandra unwrapped the paper, revealing a brightly colored game box.  "Gravity Maze," she read, looking at the label.  "So you try to move the marble by building stacks? Thanks, Eve."

"I figure it'll give you something to do while I fill out the dismissal paperwork."

Cassandra hugged Eve. "Only if you'll play a round with me later."


End file.
